<p>How should I prepare for the poem section of the lit exam? I find the poems very vague and I sometimes don’t see what the poem is trying to say until the fourth or fifth reading, which really limits my time. What should I look for in a poem? I’m also having a lot of difficulty with the archaic vocabulary.</p>
<p>A lot of it is just practice. Read some poetry (No, not the kind on the walls of the bathroom:rolleyes:.) Secondly, it helps to read the poem once, then read the questions, then go back and read the poem. Sometimes the questions can lead you onto the overal point (I had this experience once where I read the poem twice and still wouldn’t have grasped that the poem was about love). As far as archaic vocabulary, there’s not a lot to be done about that. It’s kind of an acquired taste. Every now and then, the archaic word is not important to the poem, but for the most part your best bet is to use context clues. As far as what to look for, I would recommend either SOAPS: (Subject (of the poem) Occasion (when/why is this poem taking place) Audience (Who is this poem addressed to) Point of view, Speaker (of the poem) or an abbreviated form of Strip Douglas Fairbanks (SSTTRIIPPDF):
S: Speaker
S: Structure
T: Tone
T: Theme
R:
I: Imagery
I:
P: Point of view
P:
D:
F: Figurative Language
There are others, but these are the important ones.</p>
<p>The best way to prepare is to READ! Poetry is always vague to beginners, but once you read a lot of it, you’ll start to instantly recognize things that you didn’t recognize before. I know everyone says the best way to improve your skills is to read more poetry, but they wouldn’t say it if it wasn’t true! </p>
<p>The college board has a list of selected poets to read. I’d suggest starting with the following authors (my favorites from the list, so I’m biased :p): W.H. Auden, Emily Dickinson, T.S. Eliot, Robert Frost, Langston Hughes, Ben Jonson, Philip Larkin, Edgar Allan Poe, Anne Sexton, Shakespeare (obviously), Walt Whitman and William Carlos Williams. </p>
<p>Buy some sort of anthology of American poetry, and read one a day. Look up any words you don’t know and commit them to memory so that if you encounter them again, you’ll know what they mean.</p>
<p>Some things to think about while reading…</p>
<p>1) Does this poem introduce or reinforce themes?
2) What words express thoughts or emotions? How do they create their effects?
3) What do allusions/images suggest or reveal?
4) What is the primary purpose of the poem?
5) Who is the speaker? Does this make a difference?
6) Is the vocabulary/diction important?
7) Is there any irony? Expand and describe its purpose.
8) How is form important? How does form fulfill the content?
9) Consider literary techniques:
-Rhythm?
-Rhyme?
-Deviations in form?
-Breaks in passage?
-Stream of consciousness?
-Questions in the poem?
-Transitions?
10) Be sure to think about setting, characterization, style, mood, and tone.</p>